things i would like to try

all day today i've felt like it was friday. it was a little bit of a bummer that it's only thursday, but i'm cool. today it rained. rain makes me happy. i don't want it to rain all the time, but i think today's rain was much needed, it cooled us off and made me feel a bit like fall.

i've been pretty lazy, i think i mentioned that in my last post, but i'm going to try to jump start some projects this weekend. i just need to get my tush to a fabric store.

here are some things i want to do:

grossgrain fabulous made this dress for one of her frock-by-friday projects. i bought the pattern, but i never got the fabric to make it. i would love a couple of these super simple dresses for my fall wardrobe.


this little number is in the latest lmnop fashion extra and i love it! i want to make the dress and necklace for p.


this is a semi-new restaurant in san diego called SOHO. i REALLY want to get a babysitter and have bryan to take me here. maybe before his trip to china. it looks very affordable, Delicious (reading the menu makes my mouth water) and slightly like my favorite restaurant, spark...i have been seriously craving spark and i don't know that i can wait until Christmas time! yikes. maybe this place will fill the void.

also, i think i may make cinnamon rolls for the weekend. general conference is this weekend and i am super stoked for down time with my two fravorites, getting to listen to the leaders of our church while they spiritually feed us. cinnamon rolls will definitely add to the feeding of course:).

yummy oatmeal bread and an update

hey guys! i bet you thought i fell off the side of the earth?!? nope. i am still here. i have been a bit lazy. here's a little update.

1. our health has gotten much better. bryan missed a few days of work last week, but we're back to our regular day to day this week. it feels great!

2. last week i made this honey oatmeal bread. it makes the best toast...and since we were living off of toast last week i thought this would hit the spot...and it did! i remember my parents making this delicious bread when i lived at home. my dad makes it with molasses instead of honey, both are great.

3. justin and anna came and stayed with us this weekend. we went to sea world, visited and ate delicious carne asada fries. joshua and penelope were the cutest. they had so much fun together, they really partied hard and at night they giggled so late that we had to seperate them. it was fun to see them play so well together.

4. p is a total potty star. she's practically going all on her own all day long. it is great! sometimes i need to remind her to go, but most of the time it is all her. when i leave the house i have been putting her in pull ups, but my goal is to take her in her underwear on a couple of errands this week...

3. yesterday was the hottest day EVER. i thought we might die. we went to to the beach, which was nice. while we were gone our un-air conditioned house turned into a furnace. i am guessing it was in the high 90s inside. yikes. we were supposed to have the missionaries over to eat and i was going to make fajitas, but i got stuck behind a massive accident for like an hour and couldn't get home in time to make dinner. we took the elders to in and out...at least it is air conditioned.

4. today we ate lemongrass Asian barbecue for lunch today at UCSD. it was AMAZING. every tuesday they have a little vendor fair and bryan likes to go with his co-workers to score this delicious dish. now it is ALL i can think about. must. go. next. week.

giveaway winner!

i guess it is about time i announce the lucky winner.

and the winner is:

carolyne, if you could email me and let me know your address and what color you would like (blues, yellows, violets or pinks) that would be great! thanks, e

this weekend and a banner for p

on friday i threw together this little hanging that i'm going to put above p's bed. i think it will look cute once it's all finished.

we've been having a bad stretch here at the sparks' house. some stuff is not for sharing at this point. is addition to some sad stuff, we all managed to get terribly ill. let me just say that all of us have the stomach flu and it is very good we have two bathrooms. bryan is taking today off to rest and be sick. i feel bad, because his new boss' first day is today and it isn't the best day for him to miss. penelope is currently being babysat by the tv. we are hoping for a brighter tomorrow.

tomorrow i will pick a winner for my giveaway, so enter if you haven't already.

lately

this week has been a good week for us.

here's some stuff i thought i'd share:

big girl under pants

on sunday bryan stayed home with a sick penelope. he made her play dough and of course he made her a pair of play dough shoes. cute.




dora the explorer may teach a thing or 2. a few days ago. penelope discovered that one of her pet rocks was under the tv stand. she grunted and strained to get the rock and then she said, "i can't reach! i need a rope!" what? we figured that it may be something that she picked up on dora the explorer. the last couple of weeks there's been a bit more tv watching in the sparks household. we've been mainly hanging out at home with the potty training thing going on, so i definitely give in to the tv requests more than usual.

we tried an outing to the playground, but we were only there 15 min. when she peed her pants. sweet. i felt so bad as i dragged my daughter away kicking and screaming. there was another little girl there, they were playing dolls together and it was almost too cute to bare.

tira came over and i taught her how to granny square. she was a great student...even though i am not the best teacher. seriously.

penelope is ubber obsessed with rice. she asks for rice like 3 times a day and i rarely have rice on hand. i am not sure what she sees in the stuff. BUT it does make me think of this "I like rice. Rice is great when you're hungry and you want 2000 of something." -demitri martin.

i also tried to help a deaf girl from my young women's church group how to sew. it was hard and thier wasn't a whole lot of communication. she was SUCH a trooper and put up with a great deal of finger spelling. i was humbled and wished that i'd retained more from my 3 years of sign language classes in high school. we were making modest skirts for the girls to wear to church. i think next week will go better.

the new issue of lmnop is out and is really cute.

we had a lot of fun playing with my brother, sis-in-law and their kiddos yesterday. they are going through some sad stuff and penelope and i thought they might like some company.

here's a run down of that trip:

we went to mcdonald's for lunch. joshua REALLY wanted to play in their play place. i must admit this was penelope's first experience at a mcdonald's play place... and she loved it.

i TOTALLY dropped the ball on potty training. i brought pen's potty up with us, so we could keep on keeping on, but we didn't do it. i hang my head in shame.

i bought a lava cake mix, which is a little silly because i have an amazing and very easy lava cake recipe already, but it looked so yummy i couldn't pass it up. i do so love lava cakes. now i am thinking i might want to make the mix up...like now.

this kids found a very cool preying mantis in the front yard.

the adults found that the neighbor's sewer had backed up and was all kinds of nasty.

i made them a really yum chicken and bowtie pasta in creamy pesto sauce with mini heirloom tomatoes. i kinda loved it and was glad to make it for people who enjoy italian fare... bryan won't touch anything pasta.

have a great weekend.

100 followers giveaway!

this week has been consumed, much like last week was, with potty training. it is taking longer than expected. we have had good days and bad days, but i think we are making progress. one thing you should know about penelope is that she is stubborn...a bit like me. so i've been trying to get her to think that potty training is her idea...i'll let you know how it goes.


on another note... we did it! we reached 100 followers and i am so happy to be celebrating this # with a giveaway. i am grateful for each one of you and i hope that i am able to keep the blog interesting enough to keep you around!

i have a lot of good ideas for improving the blog and one of those ideas is to create a little more structure by making up a schedule. i also would like to put a little more thought into my posts. i am not a really wordy person, but i think i filter my thoughts quite a lot. this is good and bad, but i probably can share a bit more than i do.

thanks.

here is the giveaway. i am giving one of my rosette bib necklaces away. i will pick a winner on tuesday, september 21st at 8:00 pm (pacific time.)



thanks again for all your support!
all you need to do is comment.

quilt love

i have been really into quilts lately. a week or so ago i went to the quilt museum with tira and it got me even more excited about quilting. i don't plan to become a master quilter or anything, but i think it would be fun to piece a few art quilts in addition to the one i am currently building for penelope (pictures to come.)

here is some quilt inspiration that i have found on the world wide web. lovely.

a collection of mini quilts from whip up's book on mini quilts

quilt found on etsy by pieced by kendra

purl bee always has great quilting inspiration

these were in the collection for whip up by meg at elsie marley

labor day

sorry about my absence. we had a pretty eventful week last week and we finally sold our car and are currently in the process of buying a new one. i am really glad this whole process is nearing an end. i really don't enjoy shopping for cars and i don't like pushy salesmen. i am so sad to see the audi go though. it has been a great car for us and we love her. we have driven on many snowy roads with her, we carried paintings and other large projects to and from school with her, we drove penelope home from the hospital in her, we went across the country to NYC and back in her, we've moved 4 times with her and she's kept us safe through it all. as sad as i am, it is for the best that we retire her.



i hope everyone had a splendid labor day weekend!

bryan's parents & his step bro. came into town and we got to play with them for a few days! it was a lot of fun. we went to phil's bbq again...soo delish! on saturday we went to the temple and then to sea world. we saw the shamu show, the sea lion show and blue horizons. the shows are all so fun. blue horizons was the best this time, both of the other shows were having some technical difficulties. we got wet on some of the rides and then as the sun set, the ocean breeze chilled us to the bone. we were able to tough it out through a few more exhibits and the kiddie rides, although bryan and tanner almost killed me on abby's starfish ride (like the teacup ride at disneyland.) on sunday we went to church and then went swimming in the pool. penelope got spoiled with attention and she loved every minute of it. they left monday morning :(! thank you kerry, tami and tanner for making the trip out here and playing with us.

at blue horizons

on monday afternoon we went to riverside for a bbq at justin and anna's it was a lot of fun and the food was yum! the kids played in their backyard pool and at their community playground. it was a nice and kickback labor day...which is the best kind of labor day.

we are starting potty training with penelope to day! yikes! i think she is ready and we are trying to get her excited for it. i am planning on not leaving the house this week, we may make a jont to the library for 20-30 min, but i am going to play it by ear. hopefully i will be more regular with the blogging because of this, we shall see.

ps i noticed that we are getting close to 100 followers! i am super excited about this and i will definitely be planning a good giveaway once we reach 100.